Introduction to Tourism and Hospitality Industry
This domain builds the vocabulary the rest of the syllabus depends on: what tourism is, what hospitality is, how the sectors link, and why the industry matters to India. Expect definition-based short answers and one application question.
Definitions that must be exact
- Tourism: the activities of people travelling to and staying in places outside their usual environment for not more than one year, for leisure, business or other purposes, but not for paid employment there.
- Tourist: an overnight visitor staying at least 24 hours. An excursionist is a same-day visitor who does not stay overnight.
- Hospitality: accommodation plus food and beverage service. Tourism is the umbrella that also covers transport, travel trade, attractions and events.
- Four A's of a destination: Attraction, Accessibility, Accommodation, Amenities.
Service characteristics
Intangibility, inseparability, variability, perishability and seasonality. An unsold room tonight can never be sold tomorrow, which is why hotels use yield management.
Worked example
A family from Kolkata spends five days in Puri and returns home. Classify the trip. Reasoning: they remained within India, so it is domestic tourism; they stayed more than 24 hours, so they are tourists, not excursionists; they did no paid work in Puri, so the purpose condition is met. Their spending on hotel, food, transport and handloom purchases circulates locally, showing the tourism multiplier.
Traps that cost marks
- Writing that tourism means only leisure travel; business and MICE travel count.
- Using excursionist and tourist interchangeably.
- Treating hospitality and tourism as synonyms.
- Omitting the "not for employment" condition from the definition.